Crisis center is a mother's helper

Toccoa Life offers pregnant women support and options

Posted: Monday, May 22, 2000

By Janet JonesStaff Writer

TOCCOA -- Fifteen years ago, a group of women began praying about concerns in their Stephens County community. Among the many topics that continued to come up in the prayer sessions was abortion -- an issue which they felt affected a number of young women in the Toccoa area.

As the women continued to pray, one of them, Barbara Mattison, began to talk to her husband, John, about her concerns and her desire to prevent abortions. Looking at statistics, Barbara and John said they realized that by 1985, 15 million babies were being aborted each year.

Those statistics, combined with the couple's desire to help others, spurred the beginning of Toccoa Life.

''We started with enough money to rent a building and pay the bills for one month -- God has taken care of the rest for 15 years now,'' Barbara said.

In those 15 years, the organization has spread to Habersham and Hart counties and has counselors available in Banks, Elbert, Franklin, Rabun and White counties.

While Toccoa Life does serve as a crisis pregnancy center for women contemplating abortion, it is considerably different from other such centers, according to the Mattisons, who themselves have six children and 18 grandchildren.

In addition to initial counseling, volunteer counselors with the centers continue to provide assistance for the women beyond the birth of the baby.

''If the women do decide to keep the baby, that doesn't mean that our job is done,'' Barbara said. ''It's not just the nine months of pregnancy that can be a problem -- the mother may still need assistance beyond the baby's birth. We don't think it's fair to tell a woman to keep her baby because it's the right thing to do, then just tell her she's on her own to raise the child.''

One program which Toccoa Life began in order to help mothers is Adopt-A-Mom, which involves community members ''adopting'' a mother while she is pregnant and continuing to help her beyond the birth of the child until the mother feels stable on her own.

According to the Mattisons, one of the first women who was helped by Adopt-A-Mom was a Toccoa woman who, after deciding to keep her baby, was confined to two months of bed rest at the end of her pregnancy. The woman was making payments on a car she had recently purchased which she used to travel to her new job. After being confined to bed rest, the woman was unable to work and, thus, unable to make payments on her car.

Toccoa Life volunteers pooled resources to help the woman. They paid her utility bill, provided her with food and worked with the car dealership to get payments deferred on her vehicle until she was able to resume payments herself.

Another Adopt-A-Mom participant needed a car to get to her job, but could not afford to buy one after having a baby. A Toccoa life volunteer found someone willing to donate a used car to the mother, according to John.

While the main goal of Toccoa Life is to encourage women to keep their babies, unlike other crisis pregnancy centers, Toccoa Life offers several different services to women who decide to have abortions -- the main service being post-abortion counseling.

''If the woman chooses to have an abortion, we don't want to condemn her for her decision,'' John said. ''If a woman leaves our center, goes and has an abortion, and feels like she can never come back here for fear of being judged, then we haven't done our job. If we've made her angry and condemn her then we've lost.''

Commenting on why the centers offer post-abortion counseling, John said, ''A woman who has an abortion goes through a horrible time because she is encouraged not to tell anyone what she has done. No one puts their arms around her to hug her, there's no funeral held to help her deal with her loss. We offer post-abortion counseling so that women can cope with the loss of a child and any other feelings she may be dealing with,'' John said.

The centers do not limit the post-abortion counseling to women.

''After operating the center for a number of years, we began to realize that abortion can be difficult for a man to deal with, too. People don't realize that it may be even more difficult for a man to discuss his feelings about having a child aborted than it is for a woman,'' Barbara said.

In addition to offering crisis pregnancy and post-abortion counseling, the centers also offer free pregnancy tests, provide maternity clothes and clothes for children up to size 12, and hosts seminars throughout Northeast Georgia encouraging teens to wait until marriage before having sex.

Each of the centers, which are non-profit, function through donations from area churches, organizations and community members. All of the donated money and goods are given to the mothers and children, according to the Mattisons.

''There is a local motorcycle club which does a diaper run for us every year,'' John said. ''It's the funniest thing you've ever seen -- 50 bikers roaring down the street with bags of Huggies strapped to their backs.''

Each year, Toccoa Life hosts a community Christmas party, selecting specific gifts for each child that attends because each of them is special to the Mattisons.

''Every year, we see over 500 kids at the Christmas party -- those are 500 kids whose moms came to Toccoa Life and, as a result, decided not to have abortions,'' Barbara said. ''We look into each set of those eyes and we thank God that they are able to be with us.''